We reopened the clinic Jan 3 joined by Jake who is an EMT. January was quieter than usual and we didn’t even have a huge influx of patients like we usually do. Emergencies were down until February when they seemed to explode. Lisa, a nurse practitioner student came to help us for a little over a week mid January. In February we had a team who worked with both HHM and SOL which has a nearby orphanage. The medical component stayed with us and had a doctor and several nurses to help out. One of the nurses Lois, gave CPR classes during the morning conferences. Her husband Dennis made some much needed benches for our front waiting room. He also gave a half day seminar on security for our small security force. We are also blessed regularly by teams from other nearby ministries who help us. Some come to pray and evangelize, others to count pills, and most work as nurses or doctors seeing and caring for our many patients (58,000 now).

Mechanical Problems

Our batteries which were 5 1/2 years old began to fail badly. Ed ordered new ones that are supposed to have more capacity and last longer. He built a shelf that spaces them out for airflow to keep them cool and an automatic watering system to keep them topped off easier for better maintenance. He also installed shrink wrap to decrease oxidation on the terminals. During this time the generator’s turbo charger went out. It took a week or so to figure out what was wrong. Reuben, a diesel mechanic who has been a big help to us, helped Ed get it figured out, ordered and get Ed instructions on how to install it. We got a rebuilt one and sent the old one back. Also about this time our dump truck which had been on loan to a ministry doing work in the area around Les Cayes hit by the cyclone, sent the truck back and unfortunately, the transmission fluid was low and it was ruined. Our Haitian mechanic was able to find a used transmission and get it installed and drive the truck back home. Then our KIA which regularly goes over the mountains to Jacmel, had bad brakes and clutch. Ed was struggling to keep up as each issue hit on top of the one before it. All are now fixed and what a relief to have good electricity and vehicles that function well.

Some of our Patients

Those of you who keep up on our FaceBook group or page will have seen the stories of some of our patients. We have had several recently with serious eye infections, one this week had to be hospitalized to prevent the infection from spreading to her brain. We are blessed to have optometrists at the Christianville Eye Clinic to work with at times when we have these problems. We have had several patients have heart surgery in the last year. Little Hilaire (photo on slide show) came in February after a successful surgery at St. Damien’s in Port au Prince to fix his problem. He is all smiles. Another of our cardiac kids, Samuel seen on oxygen here, was flown out to Mirebalais because he had contracted pneumonia on top of his major heart issues. We have a woman with an unusual blood problem that we fear may be serious. Jim was able to do a biopsy of her bone marrow and we sent it to International Pathology who reads all our biopsies for us. We will know soon if or how we can treat her problem. Yesterday we were the first evacuation to use Haiti Air Ambulance’s new baby pod. It is a self contained “Baby Seat” for the helicopter. It encases the baby in a protective hard shell padded by an inflatable cradle inside. 3 day old Markens was struggling to breathe and had not been nursing well. He was flown to St. Boniface hospital in Fond des Blancs where we hope he will grow strong enough to go home with Mom.

Rigan Louis, our 2nd Haitian Nurse Practitioner

Rigan Louis joined our staff the beginning of February after finishing his 500 hours of post clinical training. He is fitting in well with our staff and continues to learn from Jim as well as on his own so he can better serve our patients for Christ.

Decisions for Christ

In the last 2 months we have had 9 people make professions of faith in Jesus Christ. A team from Christianville came for a week praying with those waiting in our lobby and sharing the Gospel message. What a blessing to be able to do so. Many asked for prayer from these visitors to their country. When 2 or 3 gather together agreeing in prayer, God hears and answers!

New HHM Sign

We love the new sign that Ed installed so that we can keep our notifications dry. It welcomes our patients and announces the next day we will be closed.

Prayer Requests

1. Praise God for His provisions to care for the sick of Haiti through HHM.

2. Please continue to pray for replacements for Jim as Medical Director and Sandy as Administrator.

3. Ed and Pat Gilsbach will be heading back to the US in March. What an answer to prayer they have been for us! Please pray for a full time replacement for maintenance and part time administrative assistant as well as for their transition back to the US.